


On the Edge of Hearing

by shadow_djinni



Series: All The Stars Aligned [7]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Day 1: Back to Back, M/M, Mild Injuries, Minor Violence, Sexus Mini Event 2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-20 11:16:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13716540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadow_djinni/pseuds/shadow_djinni
Summary: When things on the ground go bad, Sendak is grateful he has Haxus for support.





	On the Edge of Hearing

**Author's Note:**

> Woohoo! Mini event for the best boys, at long last! (Yes, I know I'm a day late. Don't remind me.)

Sendak tasted copper on the back of his tongue.  He forced his eye open, wincing at the shaft of light that lanced through the parted eyelids and nearly blinded him.  His head rung--or maybe it was his ears ringing, he  _ knew _ there were things he should have heard that couldn’t get through.  He pushed himself upright, shook his head, trying to clear it.  The world around him blurred, clouds of grey dust and flashes of red-magenta-green-violet light and ashen earth and piles of something his blurred vision couldn’t bring into relief.  There was something he’d been doing, wasn’t there?  Yes, there was, there was something, it was  _ right _ on the edge of his consciousness--

A hand landed on his shoulder, and Sendak jumped and spun toward the touch.  Another Galra, armor dulled by dust, head and face coated with it, one side of his face smeared with bluish blood.  A blaster was clutched in his other hand, and his wide golden eyes fixed on Sendak’s face with a look somewhere between terror and relief.  But who--

Oh.  “Haxus?” Sendak asked.  His tongue felt thick in his mouth, and he couldn’t hear his own voice, only feel the vibration of it in his throat.

Haxus’s face brightened.  His mouth moved, too quickly for Sendak to read his lips, and Sendak grabbed for his hand and squeezed it.

“I can’t hear you,” he said.  Or, rather, he thought he’d said it.  Haxus’s eyes widened further, and he crouched so he and Sendak were level and put his blaster on the ground.

“I’m sorry,” he signed, long-fingered hands darting sharply.  “I didn’t realize the explosion might have injured your ears.  Are you alright?”

Sendak didn’t trust his hands to be steady enough to sign.  “I think so,” he said.  “Except the ears, I can’t--they’re not working--”

His voice must have wobbled on that, because Haxus leaned forward and pulled Sendak into a hug, brushing the side of his face against Sendak’s and squeezing tightly.  Then he pulled back and moved his hands where Sendak could see them.  “I’m going to comm the cruiser so they know we’re coming and get you to the rendezvous point, okay?” he signed.  

Sendak nodded, and Haxus grabbed his blaster and rose from his crouch, peering over the heap of upturned earth that sheltered them and raising his left wrist, where his comm was hidden, to his mouth.  His lips moved quickly, again, too fast for Sendak to guess what he was saying.  Then he dropped his hand to the blaster and fired off a round, one-two-three-four-five shots, just like that.  He spun around and grabbed one of Sendak’s wrists, towing him upright.

Haxus raised three fingers, then pointed over the mound of dirt--back in the direction of the rendezvous, if Sendak’s fuzzy memory could be trusted.  Sendak nodded, and Haxus nodded back.  Then he lowered a finger.  Sendak grabbed for the hilt of the knife still sheathed at his thigh, grinning when his hand closed around it.

Haxus lowered the next finger, and Sendak wondered what the cue was.  He tensed anyway, braced to leap over the mound and make a break for it.

The third finger went down, and Sendak vaulted over the heap.  His legs wobbled on his landing, not quite steady enough to support him.  Haxus surged up next to him and braced his shoulder against Sendak’s side.  Sendak leaned against him gratefully, then took the next staggering steps towards the rendezvous.  Haxus kept pace, blaster at the ready, occasionally bumping Sendak’s shoulder with his own to keep him on track.

They made the next outcropping, a tangled wreckage of steel and glass Sendak barely recognized as a fighter pod, and ducked behind it.  Haxus heaved a sigh that looked like relief and peeped over the top.  He ducked almost immediately.  A green blaze of light ripped through the air where his head had been not a tick later.  He popped back up again and fired his blaster, ducked back below and pressed his back against the steel.  Sendak leaned against him, pressing his shoulder against Haxus’s.  Haxus shifted his position until his back rested against Sendak’s, leaned their heads together.

“How many?” Sendak asked.  He  _ hoped _ he was quiet enough that the enemy wouldn’t hear him.

Haxus peered over the lip of metal, then ducked back.  “Three, but you’re not going out to fight them,” he signed.  

The wreckage shuddered, and Sendak thought he heard something thud against it.  The ringing in his ears was beginning to subside.  Good.  He wasn’t deafened after all.  That was a relief, actually--he wasn't sure what the military would  _ do _ with him if he had been.  Haxus leaned past Sendak, peering around the corner of the wreck.  Then he ducked back as red tracer fire laced the now empty space.  Sendak felt the heat of the blasts, the wind of their passage on his face, and did his best not to flinch from it.  He reached for Haxus, and Haxus grabbed his hand and squeezed it reassuringly.  Sendak turned to look at him.

“What’s our plan?” he asked--and, yes, he wasn’t deafened, he could faintly hear his own voice.

Haxus scowled.  “I’m going to check the cockpit,” he signed.  “There should be another blaster inside, and if it’s intact I’m giving it to you.  We won’t get past those little  _ cowards _ with just one of us shooting.”

“I could--”

“You are  _ not _ going to rush them.  They will shoot you, and I  _ refuse _ to watch that.”

“So don’t watch.”

“That isn’t the point, and you know it.  Stay  _ put _ .  I’m getting the other blaster, and if you so much as think about rushing them I am going to shoot you myself.”  His signs had gone sharp and jagged with distress, and Sendak lowered his ears and nodded.  Haxus narrowed his eyes.  Sendak flattened himself a little closer to the ground, as submissive as he could get, and Haxus nodded, apparently satisfied.  Then he turned and made his way towards the wreckage of the cockpit, keeping low to avoid drawing attention.

Sendak peeped up over the top of the wreck.  He couldn’t see much through the billowing clouds of ash and dust, but the dim, humped shapes of their attackers were faintly visible through the murk.  He was almost relieved Haxus had ordered him not to rush them--they were just far enough away to react before he reached them.  And, really, being shot was never pleasant.  He’d done it just often enough to not want to do it again.  He ducked back behind the wreck and waited, unbearably tense.  Not being able to hear was going to fuck him up--Sendak hadn’t realized how much he  _ relied _ on his ears to compensate for his missing eye.

A clod of dirt bounced into his vision, and Sendak spun in the direction it had come from, ruff rising and hand falling to his knife.

Only Haxus, scrambling back down from the wrecked cockpit.  A second blaster was slung across his chest.  A tick later he was back at Sendak’s side, pressing the blaster into his hands and grinning with teeth.

“You stay here, I’m going down to the other end of the wreck,” he signed.  “We’ll divide their attention.  They can’t focus on both of us.”

Sendak nodded.  Haxus nodded back and took off, and Sendak peered over the top of the wrecked fighter again.  The enemy hadn’t moved any closer--a shame, really, Sendak was a  _ bad _ shot, and they were right at the edge of his accurate range.  He sighed, lined up the first blurry shape in his sights, and fired.

The blast cut the air directly over their head.

Immediately, all three turned toward his position.  Sendak dropped below the wreck again.  He felt the metal shudder against his back.  One shot, two three four five six seven--

The shots abated, and Sendak peered around the end of the wreck.  They’d turned, firing away from him--toward Haxus’s end.  Sendak lined up and fired again, this time a burst of rapid-fire shots in their general direction rather than one shot.  Maybe he hit something.  He wasn’t sure.  He ducked back behind the wreck again and squeezed his eye shut, waiting for them to finish firing on him.

The wreck quit shuddering.  Sendak peeked around the side again.

Only two this time.  He must have taken one down, or else Haxus had.  He fired off another round, then ducked again, waited for the shooting to subside.  And again, and again, feeling himself slide into the rhythm of it, the altered state of killing.

A hand clamped down on his shoulder.  Sendak flinched, spun back towards the touch with his blaster at the ready.

It was only Haxus.  Sendak slumped in relief.  

“We’re clear,” Haxus signed.  “Transport in five doboshes.  We need to hurry.”

Sendak nodded, let Haxus pull him back upright.  He was trembling, he noticed, heart racing far too quickly.  Haxus squeezed his hand.

The sprint to the next shelter--a crater from a bomb, still scorched and smoking at the bottom--was an easy one, and from there--

Sendak could already see the transport pod coming down, so close he could reach out and touch it.  He was practically vibrating under his skin, taut as wires and looking around frantically, trying to compensate for his slow-returning hearing.  The only thing keeping him from flying apart was Haxus’s hand in his, their fingers laced together, an anchor to his body.  Haxus restrained him.  Haxus shielded him and comforted him.  Haxus counted down the time to their next sprint on his wrist, fingers tapping rhythmically at the exposed flesh peeping out past the end of his armor.

And then they were moving again, racing across the exposed ground to the transport.  Sendak’s legs were unsteady, wobbling at any slight unevenness underfoot.  Haxus pulled him on, forcing him forward, and then their boots hit the boarding ramp and it was over.  It was over.  Sendak took two steps into the bay and let his legs buckle under him.

Haxus sank down beside him and pulled Sendak into his lap, cradling him against his chest.  Sendak let his eye slide closed and slumped, letting the shaking work its way out, feeling the comforting vibration of Haxus’s voice against his cheek.

The first thing he properly heard--and the last thing, before he slipped into darkness, was Haxus’s voice.

“--Alright, you’re alright.  I’ve got you, my heart.  I’ve got you, you’re going to be alright.  I’m here.”


End file.
